Calavera Hills Elementary: Most kids here clear the bar, year after year. The question is what happens after that.
Calavera Hills posts 67% meeting the standard, and 37.8% going well past it. Most kids here keep up. Fewer get pushed further. Ask the school what it does for a child who already finds the work easy.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 62 | 38% | 67% | -21.3 | 10.7% | 1.3% |
| CA average · Elementary School | 45 | 21% | 43% | -2.9 | 17.9% | 1.6% |
Calavera Hills Elementary scores 62 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 84th percentile of 5,744 California elementary schools (CDE CAASPP 2025).
Measures test performance, attendance, and climate — not arts, community, or your kid. How we score →
🏫 Solid Base — Ask what the school does for a kid who's already meeting the standard with room to spare — steady proficiency across the board doesn't tell you whether the strongest kids are being pushed further.
Most rating sites would stop at “67% proficient” and call it done. Calavera Hills deserves a closer read. The school sits in Carlsbad, where two in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 76th to the 84th percentile since 2019 — past roughly 400 elementary schools.
The pandemic drop is behind this school: 67% of students meet the standard today, above the 62% who did in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 66% | 60% | 54% | 64% | 80% |
| Grade 4 | 60% | 57% | 61% | 64% | 57% |
| Grade 5 | 76% | 71% | 69% | 71% | 67% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 67% | 54% | 68% | 62% | 83% |
| Grade 4 | 48% | 57% | 60% | 60% | 59% |
| Grade 5 | 55% | 47% | 53% | 50% | 53% |
The story this school is actually telling
The school, grade by grade
ELA · CAASPP 2024–25Different students, same year — each bar is one grade's proficiency mix.
The honest read: the share exceeding falls 6.1pp across grades; the floor slips 12.6pp. The state average rises 4.5pp over the same span. A school visit and conversation with teachers will tell you more than this number.
The 6 things our score weighs
Ask how the school challenges kids who clear the standard early. The gap between meeting and exceeding is where pacing shows.
- Ask what changes between grade 3 and grade 5 here, and who teaches the older kids.
- Ask whether the tour can step into a working classroom — watch how the teacher handles a student who's stuck.
- Ask to tour while school's in session, and notice how hallways and transitions feel — culture shows up between classes, not just in them.
- Ask how the school communicates with families when a child starts to struggle.
- Ask what a typical day looks like for a new student in the first few weeks.
How every group of students does here
At Calavera Hills Elementary in Carlsbad, 45.7% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 52.8% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Calavera Hills Elementary trails its district average for low-income students by 7.2 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (44.6% Math proficient); Hispanic students (43.8% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 24.4 percentage points for hispanic students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 92 students tested.
7 of 14 student groups here are too small to report — a privacy protection, not a gap.
Change in proficiency from the lowest tested grade — which groups gain ground the longer they stay. Groups with fewer than 10 tested students per grade are not shown.
Low-income student ELA proficiency rises by 4.1pp from grade 3 to grade 5 at this school. District average: +7.6pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Where the path goes
The path below follows attendance boundaries — scores shown for each next step.
Feeder patterns derived from NCES attendance boundary data. Boundaries are approximate and may have changed — verify with your school district for current assignments.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
$533 per student arrives as federal Title funding — a measure of concentrated need, not school quality.
The district's current expense of education per student, from CDE's annual SACS filing — the freshest district spending figure the state publishes.
District-level, from the district's own SACS general-ledger filing — school-by-school breakdowns aren't published by the state.
Source: NCES F-33 · Full district breakdown →
The neighborhood it serves
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates (2024) · ZIP-level
Transitional kindergarten is offered here — confirmed by actual Census Day enrollment, not just the listed grade span.
On the state's science test (CAST), 43% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Calavera Hills Elementary a good elementary school?
What are Calavera Hills Elementary's CAASPP test scores?
How does Calavera Hills Elementary rank in California?
Is Calavera Hills Elementary getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Calavera Hills Elementary?
How does Calavera Hills Elementary compare to other schools in Carlsbad?
How does Calavera Hills Elementary serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 68
Nearby Middle Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 41
Private alternatives nearby
Private schools within ~10 miles. These schools do not participate in state testing and cannot be scored or ranked.
Every number on this page
Score factors, grade-level breakdowns, subgroup proficiency, and peer comparisons.
| ELA | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 54 | 48% | 31% | 15% | 6% | 80% | +36 |
| Grade 4 | 61 | 30% | 28% | 21% | 21% | 57% | +13 |
| Grade 5 | 88 | 42% | 25% | 18% | 15% | 67% | +19 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 54 | 48% | 35% | 7% | 9% | 83% | +38 |
| Grade 4 | 61 | 30% | 30% | 33% | 8% | 59% | +17 |
| Grade 5 | 88 | 30% | 24% | 33% | 14% | 53% | +18 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 88 | 24% | 19% | 48% | 9% |
CAST is tested in grades 5, 8, and once in high school — not annually. Not part of the Scope Score.
| Subgroup · ELA | Tested | MET+ | vs district | vs CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 92 | 45.7% | −7 | +7 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 89 | 43.8% | −11 | +5 |
| White | 83 | 88.0% | +12 | +26 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calavera Hills Elementary ← | — | 62 | 37.8% | 66.6% | −21.3 | 1.3% |
| Kelly Elementary | 2 mi | 78 | 51.0% | 79.7% | −0.7 | 0.5% |
| Magnolia Elementary | 2.2 mi | 69 | 45.3% | 78.5% | +0.1 | 1.2% |
| Casita Center for Science/Math/Technology | 1.4 mi | 58 | 39.2% | 65.8% | −1.8 | 0.7% |
| California average | — | 45 | 21.3% | 42.7% | −2.9 | 1.6% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 56 | 76 | #1336 | 32.7% | 62.1% | 11.7% | 1.6% | -0.8pp |
| 2022 | 57 | 84 | #896 | 31.4% | 57.7% | 27.1% | 1.1% | +1.6pp |
| 2023 | 54 | 79 | #1228 | 30.7% | 60.9% | 23.0% | 2.6% | -0.0pp |
| 2024 | 60 | 83 | #995 | 34.6% | 61.8% | 12.6% | 0.8% | -2.4pp |
| 2025 | 62 | 84 | #898 | 37.8% | 66.6% | 10.7% | 1.3% | -21.3pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 11.0% | 8.8% | -2.2pp |
| Male | 12.3% | 11.6% | -0.7pp |
| Asian | 14.3% | 12.5% | -1.8pp |
| Black/African American | 12.5% | — | — |
| Hispanic/Latino | 12.7% | 13.8% | +1.1pp |
| Two or More Races | 14.3% | 4.9% | -9.4pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 22.2% | 15.0% | -7.2pp |
| English Learners | 14.9% | 18.6% | +3.7pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 18.4% | 15.3% | -3.1pp |
| All Students | 11.7% | 10.2% | -1.5pp |
SchoolScope scores and verdicts are our interpretation of public California Department of Education data — independent analysis, not an official rating. How we analyze · Request a correction